Two candles – that seemed right. Actually, “right” wasn’t good enough – it had to be perfect. Evelyn had spent all day at the grocery store, the bakery, the liquor store – it had to be just the way it should be. The white table cloth with the red napkins in the red napkin rings. The red wine ready for the 2 crystal glasses that Karen had lent her for just this occasion. Even the lustrous red sunset – still early in mid-February – seemed to promise the perfect Valentine evening.
And after the dinner, if he had not already guessed that something was different because she wasn’t sharing the wine with him, she would tell him. And she would see the look in his eyes – the same look she had fantasized about since the moment the results of the pregnancy test had been confirmed. He would be surprised, ask questions like “When?” Or even “Are you sure?” And take her in his arms and hold her – and tell her that he would be there for her – and . . .
And then it wasn’t that way. Funny, she couldn’t seem to hear the words. His mouth moved, his face contorted. Evelyn couldn’t get the words, but she did get the message. And it had absolutely nothing to do with being there for her – nothing to do with her, or the baby, at all. Nothing to do with the two of them. Only himself. And it was then that she knew that there would be no baby, no one to tell her when to breathe during labor, and no “white house with the picket fence” for her.
She knew that she couldn’t do it alone. The morning sickness, the diapers – Evelyn didn’t harbor any romantic illusions. She couldn’t count on much help either -- Karen had her own life to lead, her mother was, well, her mother, and . . . well, at least the nurse had understood. When Evelyn had originally received the pregnancy confirmation at the doctor’s office, the nurse had asked her whether this was what Evelyn had been hoping for. At the time, she hadn’t been able to believe her ears. Yes, of course, what do you think I am? Yes, this is exactly what I had been hoping for. So, a few days later, feeling like a total fool, Evelyn went back to the office, found the same nurse, and told her that it just wasn’t going to work out. The nurse hadn’t seemed to judge her – in fact, she smiled gently and helped Evelyn to set up the appointment for the procedure.
You might think that would signal the end of the problem. No – not on a couple of fronts. The motherfucking bastard kept calling, kept stopping by, kept trying to give her flowers, candy, everything except the one thing she had wanted. She wondered whether he did not actually understand the language – she thought that the phrase “fuck off” lacked the apparent ambiguity that he seemed to perceive. Finally she had to tell him that the next step was a restraining order. Later she heard that the motherfucking bastard had told his friends that he had broken up with her because she was frigid. That she needed help – God knows he had tried his best -- and he truly wished her the best of luck in the future.
Then there were the television shows. She would turn on the TV and the host of the program would open the manila envelope and say to the young man sitting there, “The DNA testing shows that you. . . are. . . the father. And the girl sitting between them would start jumping up and down, screaming, “I (bleeping) known it, you (bleeping bleep bleep). No way you ever gonna see that baby, even you git down on your knees an’ kiss my (bleeping) ass!” And the host would pull her aside and say. “Think of your baby, Yolanda. Every child needs a father. At least talk to Devon.”
And, by the end of the next commercial break, Yolanda and Devon would be just so cool with each other that Evelyn wanted to throw up.
And, of course, there was Grace at work – the department store job. Grace would simply disappear at certain times of the day – everyone knew that she and her husband were going through the world’s most complicated and expensive infertility treatments. Every month Grace looked just a little more like her world was coming to an end. To make matters worse, Evelyn had struck up something of a friendship at some point, and Grace seemed to look for Evelyn to provide support and strength as she careened from one disappointment to the next – all in the name of potential motherhood. But what Grace wanted most in the world, Evelyn had given up – and there was no way that Evelyn could bear to listen to Grace’s troubles. And that just added to her guilt.
It wasn’t just that. It was every day. Every woman she passed on the street was pregnant, or was pushing a stroller, or was pregnant and pushing a stroller. Even worse, sometimes, there would be a man, obviously a spouse or significant other, and he would be obviously linked to the child. It get to the point where Evelyn couldn’t even set foot in an art museum or look at an art book – there were too many Mary Cassatt pastels and Raphael Madonnas. It was everywhere.
Already Christmas in the department store was starting to drive her crazy. Or crazier, she supposed. Mothers bringing their children in to see Santa. Manger scenes on church lawns – every Mary had a Joseph.
Thank God for Karen. Karen understood – at least Karen loved her. And the latest letter from Karen had said – what had it said? That’s right, she hadn’t read it yet. There was Michel, and the phone call, and the blueberry tea, and the overwhelming scent of blueberries. . .
Monday, July 27, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
The Scent of the Blueberry - 7
“I can’t come to the phone right now but, if you’ll leave your name, phone number and a brief message, I’ll return your call as soon as I can.”
Allen wryly reflected on both the veracity and newly-found irony of his own recorded message. Allen could most definitely not come to the phone at that point, since he was securely bound at the wrists, ankles, knees, toes, thumbs. . . and, if he had been able to make it to the phone despite this predicament, the gag would have discouraged useful conversation. Of course, that might have led to his rescue, but his captor had just been pointing out all the reasons why there was no hope of escape. Allen wished that he’s just get it over with – the gloating was really too much for him to bear. No class, he reflected.
Ah, yes, his captor. . . George (previously known as The Jerk at Evelyn’s bar.) Allen’s ringing phone had interrupted George. . . and George hated interruptions.
“Really, Allen. You could have shown me the courtesy of disconnecting your telephone before your capture. I was in mid-sentence – there is absolutely no excuse for this type of rudeness. I think the world is slowly going to hell, don’t you think?” Allen just stared at him. “Oh, I think so. Slowly going to hell. Well, I do believe that it is my responsibility to accelerate the process. Wouldn’t you agree?”
By then Michel was leaving his message and George said in a low voice to no one in particular, “I’m sorry, but your little friend can’t come out to play right now. He is . . . indisposed.” He turned back to Allen. “Now, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, the twine that binds your thumbs is my new signature motif. Much more effective than merely securing your wrists. However, time grows short, so I must regrettably end our conversation. (Thank God, Allen thought.) After all, your friend may be on the way over, and it would be premature for me to conclude my business with him. You understand, don’t you?”
Allen did indeed understand – only too well.
George paused. There was a time that killing Allen would have a cause of celebration, a triumphant event. He would have carefully considered the procedure – Allen fully deserved a unique and aesthetically pleasing death, and George would have lovingly lingered over every detail of the execution. The truth was (although George wasn’t ready to admit it) that he was beginning to find all of this just a trifle . . . boring. Even the prerequisite torture no longer held the excitement for George that it once had. It was all old, just too old – like eating the finest Swiss chocolate several times a day for countless years. George craved strawberry . . . or even vanilla. Allen, well, in the end, Allen was just another hapless victim.
So where to start? He did want to act quickly, but also create a unique experience. George pulled the knife from its sheath. Usually he held it in his right hand – at last count, 63% of the time. So this time he would use his left hand. (He briefly considered using his left foot, but he had actually already done that before – and he remembered that it had been distinctly uncomfortable.)
George decided that, as he lifted his arm to strike, he would curl his hand slightly behind his head. He knew that he had done that 38% of the time overall, but only 16% of the time when he was using his left hand. And he had screamed “Out, out, brief candle!” at the moment of death only 8% of the time – probably because George loathed Shakespeare – but had he ever done that when he was using his left hand and curling it behind his head first? He couldn’t remember doing it before but, if he did it now, he had to consider the effect of not being able to use that particular technique in the future. But since he really couldn’t see any downside to that future exclusion, he went ahead and did it (after taking the ingenious and reasonable precaution of translating the Shakespearean line into German. Best to save the original English for a future occasion.)
Allen had been pleasantly surprised at the absence of torture. He knew that George had been short on time, but had fully expected at least a few excruciating moments. His last thought as he saw the knife descending toward his heart was that he didn’t have the vaguest idea why George was screaming when he was the only one who had the apparent right to scream. Actually, his very last thought was to wonder what George was screaming. Allen decided that he would try to pick up a little German next time.
As George considered the flow of blood from Allen’s chest, he shivered slightly. Not from guilt or remorse or declining adrenaline. George did not like the cold, and the situation with Allen and the telephone and the execution had distracted him from the fact that his apartment seemed unusually cold. Then a possibility occurred to George that he really didn’t like, and he walked into the bedroom. Yes, the bedroom window was open. Not wide open, but this was a ground floor apartment – so was it possible that anyone on the outside had heard anything? George was relieved that he hadn’t taken the time for any torture – the dialog could have been mistaken for the script of a television program – his only concern, he reflected wryly, should be German fans of Shakespeare. Peering out the window, he did not see anyone at all – let alone potential fans of arcane Elizabethan translations. Still, it was evidence of carelessness on his part, and the consistent success that had given rise to George’s boredom did not come from carelessness.
So it was time to go – but first he would leave a small calling card.
Allen wryly reflected on both the veracity and newly-found irony of his own recorded message. Allen could most definitely not come to the phone at that point, since he was securely bound at the wrists, ankles, knees, toes, thumbs. . . and, if he had been able to make it to the phone despite this predicament, the gag would have discouraged useful conversation. Of course, that might have led to his rescue, but his captor had just been pointing out all the reasons why there was no hope of escape. Allen wished that he’s just get it over with – the gloating was really too much for him to bear. No class, he reflected.
Ah, yes, his captor. . . George (previously known as The Jerk at Evelyn’s bar.) Allen’s ringing phone had interrupted George. . . and George hated interruptions.
“Really, Allen. You could have shown me the courtesy of disconnecting your telephone before your capture. I was in mid-sentence – there is absolutely no excuse for this type of rudeness. I think the world is slowly going to hell, don’t you think?” Allen just stared at him. “Oh, I think so. Slowly going to hell. Well, I do believe that it is my responsibility to accelerate the process. Wouldn’t you agree?”
By then Michel was leaving his message and George said in a low voice to no one in particular, “I’m sorry, but your little friend can’t come out to play right now. He is . . . indisposed.” He turned back to Allen. “Now, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, the twine that binds your thumbs is my new signature motif. Much more effective than merely securing your wrists. However, time grows short, so I must regrettably end our conversation. (Thank God, Allen thought.) After all, your friend may be on the way over, and it would be premature for me to conclude my business with him. You understand, don’t you?”
Allen did indeed understand – only too well.
George paused. There was a time that killing Allen would have a cause of celebration, a triumphant event. He would have carefully considered the procedure – Allen fully deserved a unique and aesthetically pleasing death, and George would have lovingly lingered over every detail of the execution. The truth was (although George wasn’t ready to admit it) that he was beginning to find all of this just a trifle . . . boring. Even the prerequisite torture no longer held the excitement for George that it once had. It was all old, just too old – like eating the finest Swiss chocolate several times a day for countless years. George craved strawberry . . . or even vanilla. Allen, well, in the end, Allen was just another hapless victim.
So where to start? He did want to act quickly, but also create a unique experience. George pulled the knife from its sheath. Usually he held it in his right hand – at last count, 63% of the time. So this time he would use his left hand. (He briefly considered using his left foot, but he had actually already done that before – and he remembered that it had been distinctly uncomfortable.)
George decided that, as he lifted his arm to strike, he would curl his hand slightly behind his head. He knew that he had done that 38% of the time overall, but only 16% of the time when he was using his left hand. And he had screamed “Out, out, brief candle!” at the moment of death only 8% of the time – probably because George loathed Shakespeare – but had he ever done that when he was using his left hand and curling it behind his head first? He couldn’t remember doing it before but, if he did it now, he had to consider the effect of not being able to use that particular technique in the future. But since he really couldn’t see any downside to that future exclusion, he went ahead and did it (after taking the ingenious and reasonable precaution of translating the Shakespearean line into German. Best to save the original English for a future occasion.)
Allen had been pleasantly surprised at the absence of torture. He knew that George had been short on time, but had fully expected at least a few excruciating moments. His last thought as he saw the knife descending toward his heart was that he didn’t have the vaguest idea why George was screaming when he was the only one who had the apparent right to scream. Actually, his very last thought was to wonder what George was screaming. Allen decided that he would try to pick up a little German next time.
As George considered the flow of blood from Allen’s chest, he shivered slightly. Not from guilt or remorse or declining adrenaline. George did not like the cold, and the situation with Allen and the telephone and the execution had distracted him from the fact that his apartment seemed unusually cold. Then a possibility occurred to George that he really didn’t like, and he walked into the bedroom. Yes, the bedroom window was open. Not wide open, but this was a ground floor apartment – so was it possible that anyone on the outside had heard anything? George was relieved that he hadn’t taken the time for any torture – the dialog could have been mistaken for the script of a television program – his only concern, he reflected wryly, should be German fans of Shakespeare. Peering out the window, he did not see anyone at all – let alone potential fans of arcane Elizabethan translations. Still, it was evidence of carelessness on his part, and the consistent success that had given rise to George’s boredom did not come from carelessness.
So it was time to go – but first he would leave a small calling card.
Monday, July 20, 2009
The Scent of the Blueberry -- 6
Michel grinned at her, then studied the floor like a kindergarten kid. “I totally screwed up. I locked myself out of my apartment and I can’t find the super.” Michel’s voice dropped. “And I really have to go to the bathroom.”
Evelyn smiled. “Well, I guess I can help you out. Does anyone else have a key?”
“Well, my friend Allen does.” (Evelyn smiled – “friend Allen” – of course, suspicion confirmed.) “But my cell phone battery died on me. I could go down to the pay phone at the corner, but I thought I would check to see whether I could use your phone. I hope it’s not inconvenient.”
“No, even a prisoner gets a phone call. And we can’t have you leaking all over the hallway.”
“Thanks, I really appreciate it. And my bladder will be eternally grateful.”
“Another one of my childhood ambitions achieved. But. . . your apartment, the super. . . Jorge? Do you live in this building?” Evelyn asked as she rummaged through her bag for her own key.
“Since September. Fourth floor – near the end of the hall. I hadn’t realized that you lived her until I saw you at the mailboxes last week. By the time I got there, you were gone. But your name was on the mailbox.”
Evelyn realized that she had no idea that Michel knew her last name – she certainly didn’t know his. She wasn’t sure that she liked that – it seemed to give him a slight advantage. He already knew far too much about her. Still, she realized that she was being silly. After all, Evelyn had no intention of knowing him well enough to ever care what his last name was. He would use his bathroom, call Allen, and be on his way. And she would feel that at least part of her debt would be repaid – and at a relatively low cost. No big deal – the low-fat Oreo cookies would keep for a few more minutes. Let’s see – the chocolate came from the brown vegetable food group – but what the hell was the white stuff in the middle? Well, it couldn’t be too bad, she thought – after all, it was low-fat.
As Evelyn let them into the apartment and flipped on the light switch, she reminded herself of the undeniable fact that, no matter how screwed up the rest of her life might be, she did have a point of refuge in her apartment. Her original décor had featured a kind of “impoverished college student” motif, but Evelyn had been upgrading the furnishings and décor in one room at a time . . . Living room, kitchenette, bathroom, separate bedroom. . . everything but the prerequisite cat. Her sister had visited one weekend, and they had spent most of the time rummaging through catalogs, the Internet and various furnishing stores. That one weekend – that one magic weekend – had done her more good than all the Scotches in the world, she thought. Fiber wall hangings, a sofa, everything in earth colors: browns and yellows and reds and oranges. The bedroom – now that was blue. A room for every mood, she supposed. But the place was always warm – these old apartments were always overheated, and she always felt that she could curl up on the sofa with a book and cup of tea until bedtime. Then she’d simply transport both book and comforter to the bedroom – where the curling process would be intercepted by the sleep process. If only the sleep hadn’t been interrupted by the dreams – the repetitive dreams – but maybe those would diminish in frequency and intensity as time went by. Evelyn had been told that time healed all wounds – well, she thought, she was definitely going to put that cliché to the test.
Michel emerged from the bathroom and Evelyn gave him her cell phone. “I don’t have a land-line, but the battery on this thing should be OK.” Michel nodded, “Thanks”, flipped open the phone and started to punch the keys while Evelyn went to the stove to put on the kettle. She thought that she might invite him to share a cup – it had been a while since she had cooked for a man, but maybe a cup of tea didn’t quite count as cooking. Still, she wasn’t sure where that would lead – maybe she wouldn’t play the gracious hostess. She was still debating the point when she realized that Michel had reached Allen – and reminded herself that nothing would lead anywhere with this one.
In a few moments, Evelyn overheard Michel’s explanation to Allen, but it lacked the pauses that generally characterize a conversation. Michel was leaving a message – maybe that circumstance took the decision out of her hands. Fortunately she didn’t have any plans – aside from her modeling gigs, her evening calendar seemed free for at least the next two centuries, she reflected. She went back into the living room just as Michel was flipping the phone shut.
“I’m really sorry, Evelyn. I can’t imagine where he’s gone. I’m sure he’ll be back in a few minutes. I really feel much better now, anyway. Thank you for the use of the bathroom.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble. But look, I’ve just put some tea on. You’re really not interrupting anything if you want to wait here and try again in a few minutes.” Not Evelyn’s preference but, really why not? She would probably work off all of her debt to Michel this way, and he was a good listener. And, if he said no, well that was up to him. So maybe this was a good situation, after all.
“Well, if you’re sure that it’s no trouble.”
“Absolutely sure. Do you drink tea? Herbal tea. I was planning on having some blueberry.”
“They make tea out of blueberries?” Evelyn nodded. “Well, I guess that makes sense. No limit to what you can make tea out of. OK, sure. As long as you’re sure that you don’t mind.”
“No, it’s fine. Have a seat and make yourself comfortable.”
Evelyn turned back to the stove, and thought that this process would seem much easier with a glass of Scotch than with a cup of tea. Still, it wouldn’t be so bad. She opened the box of tea bags, and the usually faint scent of the blueberries came spilling out. Usually faint but, in this case, unusually strong – almost fragrant, like a strong perfume. The room was warm, and the scent of blueberry combined with that warmth to fill her nostrils, to make her eyelids feel heavy. She lurched toward the chair, but Michel caught her before she hit the floor.
Evelyn smiled. “Well, I guess I can help you out. Does anyone else have a key?”
“Well, my friend Allen does.” (Evelyn smiled – “friend Allen” – of course, suspicion confirmed.) “But my cell phone battery died on me. I could go down to the pay phone at the corner, but I thought I would check to see whether I could use your phone. I hope it’s not inconvenient.”
“No, even a prisoner gets a phone call. And we can’t have you leaking all over the hallway.”
“Thanks, I really appreciate it. And my bladder will be eternally grateful.”
“Another one of my childhood ambitions achieved. But. . . your apartment, the super. . . Jorge? Do you live in this building?” Evelyn asked as she rummaged through her bag for her own key.
“Since September. Fourth floor – near the end of the hall. I hadn’t realized that you lived her until I saw you at the mailboxes last week. By the time I got there, you were gone. But your name was on the mailbox.”
Evelyn realized that she had no idea that Michel knew her last name – she certainly didn’t know his. She wasn’t sure that she liked that – it seemed to give him a slight advantage. He already knew far too much about her. Still, she realized that she was being silly. After all, Evelyn had no intention of knowing him well enough to ever care what his last name was. He would use his bathroom, call Allen, and be on his way. And she would feel that at least part of her debt would be repaid – and at a relatively low cost. No big deal – the low-fat Oreo cookies would keep for a few more minutes. Let’s see – the chocolate came from the brown vegetable food group – but what the hell was the white stuff in the middle? Well, it couldn’t be too bad, she thought – after all, it was low-fat.
As Evelyn let them into the apartment and flipped on the light switch, she reminded herself of the undeniable fact that, no matter how screwed up the rest of her life might be, she did have a point of refuge in her apartment. Her original décor had featured a kind of “impoverished college student” motif, but Evelyn had been upgrading the furnishings and décor in one room at a time . . . Living room, kitchenette, bathroom, separate bedroom. . . everything but the prerequisite cat. Her sister had visited one weekend, and they had spent most of the time rummaging through catalogs, the Internet and various furnishing stores. That one weekend – that one magic weekend – had done her more good than all the Scotches in the world, she thought. Fiber wall hangings, a sofa, everything in earth colors: browns and yellows and reds and oranges. The bedroom – now that was blue. A room for every mood, she supposed. But the place was always warm – these old apartments were always overheated, and she always felt that she could curl up on the sofa with a book and cup of tea until bedtime. Then she’d simply transport both book and comforter to the bedroom – where the curling process would be intercepted by the sleep process. If only the sleep hadn’t been interrupted by the dreams – the repetitive dreams – but maybe those would diminish in frequency and intensity as time went by. Evelyn had been told that time healed all wounds – well, she thought, she was definitely going to put that cliché to the test.
Michel emerged from the bathroom and Evelyn gave him her cell phone. “I don’t have a land-line, but the battery on this thing should be OK.” Michel nodded, “Thanks”, flipped open the phone and started to punch the keys while Evelyn went to the stove to put on the kettle. She thought that she might invite him to share a cup – it had been a while since she had cooked for a man, but maybe a cup of tea didn’t quite count as cooking. Still, she wasn’t sure where that would lead – maybe she wouldn’t play the gracious hostess. She was still debating the point when she realized that Michel had reached Allen – and reminded herself that nothing would lead anywhere with this one.
In a few moments, Evelyn overheard Michel’s explanation to Allen, but it lacked the pauses that generally characterize a conversation. Michel was leaving a message – maybe that circumstance took the decision out of her hands. Fortunately she didn’t have any plans – aside from her modeling gigs, her evening calendar seemed free for at least the next two centuries, she reflected. She went back into the living room just as Michel was flipping the phone shut.
“I’m really sorry, Evelyn. I can’t imagine where he’s gone. I’m sure he’ll be back in a few minutes. I really feel much better now, anyway. Thank you for the use of the bathroom.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble. But look, I’ve just put some tea on. You’re really not interrupting anything if you want to wait here and try again in a few minutes.” Not Evelyn’s preference but, really why not? She would probably work off all of her debt to Michel this way, and he was a good listener. And, if he said no, well that was up to him. So maybe this was a good situation, after all.
“Well, if you’re sure that it’s no trouble.”
“Absolutely sure. Do you drink tea? Herbal tea. I was planning on having some blueberry.”
“They make tea out of blueberries?” Evelyn nodded. “Well, I guess that makes sense. No limit to what you can make tea out of. OK, sure. As long as you’re sure that you don’t mind.”
“No, it’s fine. Have a seat and make yourself comfortable.”
Evelyn turned back to the stove, and thought that this process would seem much easier with a glass of Scotch than with a cup of tea. Still, it wouldn’t be so bad. She opened the box of tea bags, and the usually faint scent of the blueberries came spilling out. Usually faint but, in this case, unusually strong – almost fragrant, like a strong perfume. The room was warm, and the scent of blueberry combined with that warmth to fill her nostrils, to make her eyelids feel heavy. She lurched toward the chair, but Michel caught her before she hit the floor.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
The Scent of the Blueberry -- 5
That had occurred during the few days before receiving Karen’s letter. Evelyn was in the local watering hole, a relatively harmless local bar appropriately named, “Your Local Watering Hole” and commonly referenced as simply “The Hole”, nursing a Scotch that she really didn’t need and really couldn’t afford. Not an uncommon occurrence, but this time it was followed by 2 other distinctly uncommon occurrences.
The first was that a guy hit on her. Most people would not have found this surprising. Unlike fashion models, there is no real requirement that artists’ models be physically attractive. But most of them are reasonably so -- maybe because most people apparently have to possess a basic sense of physical self-esteem before disrobing in public.
Evelyn was no different – most people would consider her to be reasonably attractive, maybe beyond that with the right clothes, hairstyle and make-up. The truth was that, at the age of about 13-14, it looked like she was going to become an usually beautiful woman. Hollywood beautiful, Sports Illustrated swimsuit beautiful -- stunning. But then Evelyn had developed an unfortunate case of adolescent acne and, by the time the zits had graduated to zit heaven, somehow her facial features had developed in an ever-so-slightly uncoordinated way. Nothing that you could put your finger on but, after the age of 16 or so, she only achieved her previous potential – her features only rhymed – when she smiled. At that specific moment, the moment of smiling, she could be truly and unabashedly stunning. But Evelyn hadn’t smiled much lately.
Other than that -- medium build, figure that was, as the more traditional personal ads say, appropriate for height, long dark hair – it was quite reasonable to expect that a guy would hit on her in a bar. (Hell, some guys would hit on Norm or Cliff in a bar.) That was why Evelyn generally wore a wedding ring when she stopped by the club – a cheap band that she had picked up in a flea market for just such an occasion. After all, one fucking bastard at a time was plenty.
But this guy was an overt pain in the ass, insistent and obnoxious. He was obviously not impressed by the wedding ring, and seemed to realize that a telephone number with a 555 exchange was a phony. It would have been nice, at least convenient, if there had been a knight in shining armor to shield her from this latest manifestation of fucking bastardism but, even more surprisingly perhaps, an unexpected substitute appeared.
“I see that you’ve met my wife”, Michel casually said to the man as he slid in between them. Michel rested his elbow on the bar and flexed his right bicep ever so slightly, but also ever so impressively. “So, honey, are you going to introduce me to your new friend?”
The jerk responded immediately. “Unfortunately, ah, I have to catch my bus. Maybe a rain check?” But the last sentence was barely audible, since the man had already begun to make his way to the door.
“Honey?” Evelyn said.
“Sorry. You didn’t really know the guy, did you?” She shook her head. “Good. I’ve been accused of not picking up on these cues all the time, but it did seem that you could use a little help with him. Sorry for the familiarity – the “honey” part. Probably kind of corny, huh?”
Evelyn smiled – for the first time in a while, she realized. Too long, maybe. “That’s OK. And thank you.”
“So. You come here often?”
She laughed. “OK. I didn’t mean to issue a permanent corniness permit. On the other hand, no . . . no, I guess I don’t want you to think that I spend a lot of time alone in bars, swigging Scotch and setting myself up as a target for every asshole who comes down the pike.”
“It’s none of my business, but I just figured that maybe there had been a. . . well, maybe, unpleasant moment with your real husband. Happens to everyone sometime. Nothing unusual there.”
Evelyn looked down at the fake wedding ring. “No, Michel. That’s a fake wedding ring. Or, then again, maybe it’s no more fake than I am.”
“Beginning to sound like maybe you do come here often. Why don’t you grab your drink and we’ll move to a table.”
Evelyn thought that was just about the lamest pick-up line that she had heard for a long time, but Michel was, well, he wasn’t the guy who had just been chased out of the bar. Maybe he was just as lonely as she was – hell, judging from the scars, he could probably match her hurt for hurt, even if the story of his pain was physical rather than emotional. Last but not least, the Scotch said, “Why not?”
But over the next hour or so, a really unexpected – no, make that remarkable – thing happened. Michel hadn’t tried to pick her up. He had joined her at the table with his freshly poured ginger ale, and spent the better part of an hour actually listening to her. Listening to a semi-drunken diatribe about how men sucked, how the fucking bastard sucked, how positive self-talk sucked and, most remarkably of all, a fairly detailed account of the pregnancy and abortion – and how they both most definitely sucked. And he sat there, not seeming to judge her, offering the occasional word of sympathy or encouragement, without once even remotely suggesting that his interest was in any way directly linked to his penis. Evelyn decided that Michel had to be either gay or a saint. Or maybe both: a gay saint. Either way, she didn’t care. She couldn’t believe that she was actually sharing all of this with this semi-total stranger, even as she continued to tell him everything.
So yes, Evelyn did have mixed feelings about Michel. She did see him as strange, but she was also embarrassed that she had told him things that were so totally personal and private. And she was grateful that he had been there that evening, both in terms of the jerk he had chased off and the way he had listened to her story. But seeing him also reminded her of that story, reminded her of the jerk and the fucking bastard, and reminded her of her inability to deal with either of them – or the abortion – by herself, And she felt guilty because she knew that she owed him, but also wished that he would just go away. It wasn’t fair, but it was true.
“Hi, Michel. This is a nice surprise. What brings you here?” Nice recovery, she complimented herself.
The first was that a guy hit on her. Most people would not have found this surprising. Unlike fashion models, there is no real requirement that artists’ models be physically attractive. But most of them are reasonably so -- maybe because most people apparently have to possess a basic sense of physical self-esteem before disrobing in public.
Evelyn was no different – most people would consider her to be reasonably attractive, maybe beyond that with the right clothes, hairstyle and make-up. The truth was that, at the age of about 13-14, it looked like she was going to become an usually beautiful woman. Hollywood beautiful, Sports Illustrated swimsuit beautiful -- stunning. But then Evelyn had developed an unfortunate case of adolescent acne and, by the time the zits had graduated to zit heaven, somehow her facial features had developed in an ever-so-slightly uncoordinated way. Nothing that you could put your finger on but, after the age of 16 or so, she only achieved her previous potential – her features only rhymed – when she smiled. At that specific moment, the moment of smiling, she could be truly and unabashedly stunning. But Evelyn hadn’t smiled much lately.
Other than that -- medium build, figure that was, as the more traditional personal ads say, appropriate for height, long dark hair – it was quite reasonable to expect that a guy would hit on her in a bar. (Hell, some guys would hit on Norm or Cliff in a bar.) That was why Evelyn generally wore a wedding ring when she stopped by the club – a cheap band that she had picked up in a flea market for just such an occasion. After all, one fucking bastard at a time was plenty.
But this guy was an overt pain in the ass, insistent and obnoxious. He was obviously not impressed by the wedding ring, and seemed to realize that a telephone number with a 555 exchange was a phony. It would have been nice, at least convenient, if there had been a knight in shining armor to shield her from this latest manifestation of fucking bastardism but, even more surprisingly perhaps, an unexpected substitute appeared.
“I see that you’ve met my wife”, Michel casually said to the man as he slid in between them. Michel rested his elbow on the bar and flexed his right bicep ever so slightly, but also ever so impressively. “So, honey, are you going to introduce me to your new friend?”
The jerk responded immediately. “Unfortunately, ah, I have to catch my bus. Maybe a rain check?” But the last sentence was barely audible, since the man had already begun to make his way to the door.
“Honey?” Evelyn said.
“Sorry. You didn’t really know the guy, did you?” She shook her head. “Good. I’ve been accused of not picking up on these cues all the time, but it did seem that you could use a little help with him. Sorry for the familiarity – the “honey” part. Probably kind of corny, huh?”
Evelyn smiled – for the first time in a while, she realized. Too long, maybe. “That’s OK. And thank you.”
“So. You come here often?”
She laughed. “OK. I didn’t mean to issue a permanent corniness permit. On the other hand, no . . . no, I guess I don’t want you to think that I spend a lot of time alone in bars, swigging Scotch and setting myself up as a target for every asshole who comes down the pike.”
“It’s none of my business, but I just figured that maybe there had been a. . . well, maybe, unpleasant moment with your real husband. Happens to everyone sometime. Nothing unusual there.”
Evelyn looked down at the fake wedding ring. “No, Michel. That’s a fake wedding ring. Or, then again, maybe it’s no more fake than I am.”
“Beginning to sound like maybe you do come here often. Why don’t you grab your drink and we’ll move to a table.”
Evelyn thought that was just about the lamest pick-up line that she had heard for a long time, but Michel was, well, he wasn’t the guy who had just been chased out of the bar. Maybe he was just as lonely as she was – hell, judging from the scars, he could probably match her hurt for hurt, even if the story of his pain was physical rather than emotional. Last but not least, the Scotch said, “Why not?”
But over the next hour or so, a really unexpected – no, make that remarkable – thing happened. Michel hadn’t tried to pick her up. He had joined her at the table with his freshly poured ginger ale, and spent the better part of an hour actually listening to her. Listening to a semi-drunken diatribe about how men sucked, how the fucking bastard sucked, how positive self-talk sucked and, most remarkably of all, a fairly detailed account of the pregnancy and abortion – and how they both most definitely sucked. And he sat there, not seeming to judge her, offering the occasional word of sympathy or encouragement, without once even remotely suggesting that his interest was in any way directly linked to his penis. Evelyn decided that Michel had to be either gay or a saint. Or maybe both: a gay saint. Either way, she didn’t care. She couldn’t believe that she was actually sharing all of this with this semi-total stranger, even as she continued to tell him everything.
So yes, Evelyn did have mixed feelings about Michel. She did see him as strange, but she was also embarrassed that she had told him things that were so totally personal and private. And she was grateful that he had been there that evening, both in terms of the jerk he had chased off and the way he had listened to her story. But seeing him also reminded her of that story, reminded her of the jerk and the fucking bastard, and reminded her of her inability to deal with either of them – or the abortion – by herself, And she felt guilty because she knew that she owed him, but also wished that he would just go away. It wasn’t fair, but it was true.
“Hi, Michel. This is a nice surprise. What brings you here?” Nice recovery, she complimented herself.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
The Scent of the Blueberry -- 4
Well, OK, Evelyn knew who it was – it was Michel. It’s just that she saw Michel as being a little strange. Not especially bad strange – not ax-murderer strange – but, well, eccentric.
Michel. Evelyn remembered the first time she had met him. He was a male model, and Arthur, the community center life drawing coordinator, had inadvertently booked them both for the same session.
Arthur had been upset about it. He knew that, like most models, Michel and Evelyn weren’t in the game necessarily for the love of the activity – they needed the money. So Arthur’s solution was, as he tritely put it, to make a lemon into lemonade. He had them pose together.
Evelyn had had her doubts – she had never posed nude with a man before. But the rent had been due the following week and, with an assistant district attorney seated approximately six feet away, she figured that there wasn’t any real danger involved. Although, looking at Michel’s muscular body after he had discarded his robe, she did wonder whether a little danger might not be just what the doctor ordered for this girl. No, what am I thinking? Remember the fucking bastard! (He had still been the “fucking” bastard at that point.)
But it was OK. Michel had not touched her at any point during the evening and, much to her relief, had been enough of a professional to not develop a hard-on. Not even a little one. Probably gay, she figured. The ones with the muscles – they often seem to be. Probably wouldn’t be interested in me, well, not me personally, of course. Probably just doesn’t like girls. Thank God. (That’s one thing about modeling – even during the short poses, she had plenty of time to let her mind wander in any direction she wanted. Usually that involved self-talk – but not during that session. Evelyn let her mind wander in directions that would have totally freaked her out if she had thought for a single moment that Michel could know.)
But Michel did seem to be off in his own world. He was different – definitely different. Most of the male models tended to have well-developed bodies, Evelyn knew, so this wasn’t a surprise. But Michel – well, to begin with, there was the almost total absence of body fat. Usually the guys who lack any body fat may still be muscular, but they would still be kind of slender. Maybe “lithe” would be the right word. But there was nothing slender about Michel – he was built like a linebacker. Whenever he shifted even a fraction of an inch in the pose, different muscles – hell, entire groups of muscles that Evelyn couldn’t begin to name -- would pop out of his body, while others would retreat into hiding to make room for their newly-evident friends.
But there were 2 other things that were really unusual about Michel.
There was the scar tissue. All over his body, old and new, apparently random – they didn’t look like the results of surgery. Someone had really done a job on this guy – and not just once. Evelyn closed her eyes and tried to imagine the physical pain that had to be associated with that type of scarring, but her only real reference point was the emotional pain that she had been undergoing. And that was not a pleasant recollection. . . so she let that train of thought go. Still, she wondered. Did it hurt when he stretched? Did it hurt when someone touched him? Some of those scars looked recent. Maybe, just maybe, he enjoyed it. But that didn’t seem fair, and she felt guilty for even allowing her thoughts to wander in that direction. But, of course, posing is inherently boring, and there was plenty of time for her mind to wander all over the place.
The other unusual thing about Michel was his selection of poses. A session of so-called short poses for figure drawing generally consisted of a series of progressively longer poses, punctuated by breaks. So a model might take about 20 2-minute poses, take a break, then several 5-minute poses, then take a break, then 4-5 10-minute poses, then another break, then finish the 3-hour session with a few 15-minute poses. Evening sessions tended to be less intense than daytime sessions, and sessions at the community center were particularly laid back because a few of the artists had severe nicotine addictions that demanded considerable break time.
So the most common strategy for the models was to reserve the more strenuous poses for the first part of the evening, with simple reclining poses for the end. The strenuous poses were, of course, easier to hold for the shorter periods of time, and the relatively quick changes enabled the model to stretch and utilize complementary muscle groups. By the end of the evening, the artists understood that it was the end of the day, you had put forth a good effort, and that you couldn’t be expected to hold anything outrageous for 15 minutes anyway. Once Evelyn had even fallen asleep during the last reclining pose – she had awakened when Arthur announced the end of the session, only after a moment remembering why she was stark naked in front of a roomful of people. In retrospect, she had been glad that she hadn’t screamed – although she did wonder if she had snored.
Anyway, Michel didn’t play by the unwritten rules. Rather than assuming easier poses as the evening wore on, he pushed to assume more difficult ones. He hadn’t pushed her to go along with his posing regimen, thank God – it was obvious that Michel was used to playing a solo act. She had felt lazy, somehow unworthy, when she had assumed a simple reclining pose at the end of the evening while Michel was standing over her, weight almost entirely on one foot, arms stretched to the ceiling without quivering. That’s when she wondered whether he enjoyed pain, whether the genesis of the scars involved something that was not entirely against his will. Studying his muscles over the course of the evening or, more precisely, his control of his muscles, Evelyn wondered how easy it would be to get this man to do anything that he didn’t really want to do.
Evelyn’s next encounter with Michel was more intimate – at least, in the emotional sense. That had seemed incongruous at the time – the idea that sitting down with someone and talking could be more intimate than wordlessly cohabiting a model’s platform for 3 hours without any clothes on. But it was true.
Michel. Evelyn remembered the first time she had met him. He was a male model, and Arthur, the community center life drawing coordinator, had inadvertently booked them both for the same session.
Arthur had been upset about it. He knew that, like most models, Michel and Evelyn weren’t in the game necessarily for the love of the activity – they needed the money. So Arthur’s solution was, as he tritely put it, to make a lemon into lemonade. He had them pose together.
Evelyn had had her doubts – she had never posed nude with a man before. But the rent had been due the following week and, with an assistant district attorney seated approximately six feet away, she figured that there wasn’t any real danger involved. Although, looking at Michel’s muscular body after he had discarded his robe, she did wonder whether a little danger might not be just what the doctor ordered for this girl. No, what am I thinking? Remember the fucking bastard! (He had still been the “fucking” bastard at that point.)
But it was OK. Michel had not touched her at any point during the evening and, much to her relief, had been enough of a professional to not develop a hard-on. Not even a little one. Probably gay, she figured. The ones with the muscles – they often seem to be. Probably wouldn’t be interested in me, well, not me personally, of course. Probably just doesn’t like girls. Thank God. (That’s one thing about modeling – even during the short poses, she had plenty of time to let her mind wander in any direction she wanted. Usually that involved self-talk – but not during that session. Evelyn let her mind wander in directions that would have totally freaked her out if she had thought for a single moment that Michel could know.)
But Michel did seem to be off in his own world. He was different – definitely different. Most of the male models tended to have well-developed bodies, Evelyn knew, so this wasn’t a surprise. But Michel – well, to begin with, there was the almost total absence of body fat. Usually the guys who lack any body fat may still be muscular, but they would still be kind of slender. Maybe “lithe” would be the right word. But there was nothing slender about Michel – he was built like a linebacker. Whenever he shifted even a fraction of an inch in the pose, different muscles – hell, entire groups of muscles that Evelyn couldn’t begin to name -- would pop out of his body, while others would retreat into hiding to make room for their newly-evident friends.
But there were 2 other things that were really unusual about Michel.
There was the scar tissue. All over his body, old and new, apparently random – they didn’t look like the results of surgery. Someone had really done a job on this guy – and not just once. Evelyn closed her eyes and tried to imagine the physical pain that had to be associated with that type of scarring, but her only real reference point was the emotional pain that she had been undergoing. And that was not a pleasant recollection. . . so she let that train of thought go. Still, she wondered. Did it hurt when he stretched? Did it hurt when someone touched him? Some of those scars looked recent. Maybe, just maybe, he enjoyed it. But that didn’t seem fair, and she felt guilty for even allowing her thoughts to wander in that direction. But, of course, posing is inherently boring, and there was plenty of time for her mind to wander all over the place.
The other unusual thing about Michel was his selection of poses. A session of so-called short poses for figure drawing generally consisted of a series of progressively longer poses, punctuated by breaks. So a model might take about 20 2-minute poses, take a break, then several 5-minute poses, then take a break, then 4-5 10-minute poses, then another break, then finish the 3-hour session with a few 15-minute poses. Evening sessions tended to be less intense than daytime sessions, and sessions at the community center were particularly laid back because a few of the artists had severe nicotine addictions that demanded considerable break time.
So the most common strategy for the models was to reserve the more strenuous poses for the first part of the evening, with simple reclining poses for the end. The strenuous poses were, of course, easier to hold for the shorter periods of time, and the relatively quick changes enabled the model to stretch and utilize complementary muscle groups. By the end of the evening, the artists understood that it was the end of the day, you had put forth a good effort, and that you couldn’t be expected to hold anything outrageous for 15 minutes anyway. Once Evelyn had even fallen asleep during the last reclining pose – she had awakened when Arthur announced the end of the session, only after a moment remembering why she was stark naked in front of a roomful of people. In retrospect, she had been glad that she hadn’t screamed – although she did wonder if she had snored.
Anyway, Michel didn’t play by the unwritten rules. Rather than assuming easier poses as the evening wore on, he pushed to assume more difficult ones. He hadn’t pushed her to go along with his posing regimen, thank God – it was obvious that Michel was used to playing a solo act. She had felt lazy, somehow unworthy, when she had assumed a simple reclining pose at the end of the evening while Michel was standing over her, weight almost entirely on one foot, arms stretched to the ceiling without quivering. That’s when she wondered whether he enjoyed pain, whether the genesis of the scars involved something that was not entirely against his will. Studying his muscles over the course of the evening or, more precisely, his control of his muscles, Evelyn wondered how easy it would be to get this man to do anything that he didn’t really want to do.
Evelyn’s next encounter with Michel was more intimate – at least, in the emotional sense. That had seemed incongruous at the time – the idea that sitting down with someone and talking could be more intimate than wordlessly cohabiting a model’s platform for 3 hours without any clothes on. But it was true.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
The Scent of the Blueberry -- 3
Still, though, every once in a while she wondered whether it would have been a boy or a girl. No harm in wondering about that – even if today was the first day of the rest of her life, and she knew damned well that it did her absolutely no good to dwell on the past. He would have been a lousy father anyway. He totally sucked as a human being – so he would have totally sucked as a father. And she knew that she wouldn’t have been a good mother, either. Not yet, anyway. Maybe some day. Not until there was someone there to help her raise him. Or her. Alone? By herself? No way. She had made the right choice. The only choice.
It was the unfairness. Evelyn wished that she had been raped instead. Well, not really – of course she felt sympathy for all the women who had experienced that abuse at the hands of other fucking bastards. But at least people were sympathetic about that. They could identify themselves as rape victims and people would understand their tears, feel outrage on their behalf, and even excuse any minor behavioral oddities associated with the harsh memories of the act.
But Evelyn knew that there was no such empathy for her. Many people would condemn her for what she did, and many, if not most, of the rest would grin knowingly and say that she had made her own bed, so now she had to lie in it. Well, fuck them. There should be some rule – no, some kind of universal law – that said that a guy couldn’t tell you how much he loved you, that he wanted to grow old with you, that he wanted you to be the mother of his children – and then just leave when you became pregnant. Leave you feeling like an idiot, knowing you had fallen for the absolutely and utterly oldest line in the book, leaving you to become a statistical addition to the “single mother” category. Somewhere in the Census Bureau in Washington, there was some idiot at a desk who would have said, “well, there’s another pea-brained female – gotta chalk up one more in the ‘love ‘em and leave ‘em single mother category.’ ” Well, no fucking thank you.
There. Evelyn’s feet were wet, she was tired beyond belief, and she had successfully undone the positive effects of an entire day of self-talk. Maybe an entire week. Good.
By now she had arrived at her building. She wasn’t looking forward to the climb up to her 3rd floor apartment, but at least it probably wouldn’t be snowing in the hallway. First she checked her mail. Bill, bill, junk, bill, junk, junk, letter from her sister. Evelyn smiled despite herself. Her sister Karen was a confirmed Luddite – while the rest of the world spent much of their time sending emails, text messages, instant messages, maybe even the traditional phone calls, Karen would sit down at the kitchen table with a 29 cent ballpoint pen and a couple of sheets of cheap photocopier paper and write an actual letter. A real letter. Evelyn would keep each letter until she had her blueberry herbal tea ready. Then she would pour the steaming liquid into the mug that Karen had given her on her birthday, break open a new package of low-fat Oreo cookies, sit in her overstuffed chair and carefully slit the envelope. As she sipped and munched, she would first scan the letter, then read it, then scan it again. Then she would put the letter back into its envelope and place it on top of the rubber-banded envelopes containing Karen’s previous letters that she kept in the bedroom dresser drawer. Carefully and lovingly written letters deserved equally careful and loving treatment, she knew, and the receipt of a new letter was a suitable surrogate for countless hours of positive self-talk.
Evelyn smiled when she thought of the one special letter that Karen had sent to her. After the . . . event, the abortion, she wasn’t sure how Karen would react. Not telling her was simply out of the question – she told Karen everything – but just picking up the phone and telling her that she had just had an abortion . . . well, that was out of the question, too. So Evelyn wrote a letter to Karen and mailed it . . . then waited. For 5 days, 5 very long days, she didn’t know whether she still had a sister or not. Evelyn thought that for once, just this once, Karen might call. Call if she was supportive, not call if she wasn’t. When she didn’t hear after the 3rd day. . . Finally she received a letter back. She took it into the apartment, poured herself a Scotch rather than an herbal tea, slit open the envelope, opened the letter, and read, “That fucking bastard. . . if there’s anything I can do for you . . .” An hour later, when she had finished crying, she had poured the Scotch down the kitchen sink.
But there would be no letter ritual this evening. This time, there was a strange man waiting outside her 3rd floor apartment.
It was the unfairness. Evelyn wished that she had been raped instead. Well, not really – of course she felt sympathy for all the women who had experienced that abuse at the hands of other fucking bastards. But at least people were sympathetic about that. They could identify themselves as rape victims and people would understand their tears, feel outrage on their behalf, and even excuse any minor behavioral oddities associated with the harsh memories of the act.
But Evelyn knew that there was no such empathy for her. Many people would condemn her for what she did, and many, if not most, of the rest would grin knowingly and say that she had made her own bed, so now she had to lie in it. Well, fuck them. There should be some rule – no, some kind of universal law – that said that a guy couldn’t tell you how much he loved you, that he wanted to grow old with you, that he wanted you to be the mother of his children – and then just leave when you became pregnant. Leave you feeling like an idiot, knowing you had fallen for the absolutely and utterly oldest line in the book, leaving you to become a statistical addition to the “single mother” category. Somewhere in the Census Bureau in Washington, there was some idiot at a desk who would have said, “well, there’s another pea-brained female – gotta chalk up one more in the ‘love ‘em and leave ‘em single mother category.’ ” Well, no fucking thank you.
There. Evelyn’s feet were wet, she was tired beyond belief, and she had successfully undone the positive effects of an entire day of self-talk. Maybe an entire week. Good.
By now she had arrived at her building. She wasn’t looking forward to the climb up to her 3rd floor apartment, but at least it probably wouldn’t be snowing in the hallway. First she checked her mail. Bill, bill, junk, bill, junk, junk, letter from her sister. Evelyn smiled despite herself. Her sister Karen was a confirmed Luddite – while the rest of the world spent much of their time sending emails, text messages, instant messages, maybe even the traditional phone calls, Karen would sit down at the kitchen table with a 29 cent ballpoint pen and a couple of sheets of cheap photocopier paper and write an actual letter. A real letter. Evelyn would keep each letter until she had her blueberry herbal tea ready. Then she would pour the steaming liquid into the mug that Karen had given her on her birthday, break open a new package of low-fat Oreo cookies, sit in her overstuffed chair and carefully slit the envelope. As she sipped and munched, she would first scan the letter, then read it, then scan it again. Then she would put the letter back into its envelope and place it on top of the rubber-banded envelopes containing Karen’s previous letters that she kept in the bedroom dresser drawer. Carefully and lovingly written letters deserved equally careful and loving treatment, she knew, and the receipt of a new letter was a suitable surrogate for countless hours of positive self-talk.
Evelyn smiled when she thought of the one special letter that Karen had sent to her. After the . . . event, the abortion, she wasn’t sure how Karen would react. Not telling her was simply out of the question – she told Karen everything – but just picking up the phone and telling her that she had just had an abortion . . . well, that was out of the question, too. So Evelyn wrote a letter to Karen and mailed it . . . then waited. For 5 days, 5 very long days, she didn’t know whether she still had a sister or not. Evelyn thought that for once, just this once, Karen might call. Call if she was supportive, not call if she wasn’t. When she didn’t hear after the 3rd day. . . Finally she received a letter back. She took it into the apartment, poured herself a Scotch rather than an herbal tea, slit open the envelope, opened the letter, and read, “That fucking bastard. . . if there’s anything I can do for you . . .” An hour later, when she had finished crying, she had poured the Scotch down the kitchen sink.
But there would be no letter ritual this evening. This time, there was a strange man waiting outside her 3rd floor apartment.
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